I-Team Payroll Project: UC’s highest paid employees

Cincinnati head coach Mick Cronin shouts instructions to his players during the overtime period of an NCAA basketball game against Georgetown, Saturday, Feb. 7, 2009, in Washington. The Bearcats won 64-62 in an overtime.

The University of Cincinnati’s athletic director and basketball and football coaches were together paid more last year than the school’s 10 top academics and administrators combined.

The school’s top paid employee last year was head basketball coach Mick Cronin, who grossed $2.25 million. His pay along with head football coach Tommy Tuberville and athletics director Michael Bohn totaled more than $5 million.

UC’s highest paid administrator, by contrast, was Beverly Davenport, who served as interim university president from July 2016 to February 2017 and was paid $686,740 last year. The 10 highest-paid non-sports administrators — including Davenport — made $4.5 million, barely more than the combined pay for Cronin and Tuberville alone.

Payroll Project

Former UC president Santa Ono, who left mid-year to become president and vice chancellor of the University of British Columbia, was paid $427,517 last year, including seperation payments he cashed out upon leaving.

An I-Team investigation found public employees’ ability to cash out unused sick and vacation leave is a rare perk in the private sector, and collectively costs state and local governments hundreds of millions of dollars.